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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/22729783">Queen's Gambit</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/daaeleira/pseuds/daaeleira'>daaeleira</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Series:</b></td><td>Mirror, Mirror (Earth-645) [3]</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>Marvel Cinematic Universe</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>F/M, Flirting, Manipulation, Pre-Relationship</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>Completed</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2020-02-15</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2020-07-03</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-04-28 17:00:38</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>Not Rated</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>7</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>12,591</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/22729783</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/daaeleira/pseuds/daaeleira</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>One month after the Battle of New York, Leila's still settling back into her life when Fury gives her an assignment: convince Steve Rogers to allow SHIELD to test him to try to recreate the super-soldier serum. This, however, turns out to be Fury's way of giving her an in for her real mission: convince Steve Rogers to join SHIELD as a special agent. </p><p>Leila's no stranger to the art of subtle persuasion, but Steve Rogers is a hard nut to crack, and seems to catch every verbal sleight-of-hand she performs. It turns out, the quickest way to earn his trust is honesty--a different subtle art to which Leila is, actually, a stranger. </p><p>(Oh, and also, there's a bomb crisis, because of course there is.)</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Relationships:</b></td><td>Nick Fury &amp; Original Female Character(s), Steve Rogers &amp; Original Female Character(s), Steve Rogers/Original Female Character(s) (pre-relationship), peripheral Brock Rumlow/OC</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Series:</b></td><td>Mirror, Mirror (Earth-645) [3]</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Series URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/series/800076</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>9</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>32</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>1. Chapter 1</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>
  <em>I know she knows I'm not fond of asking</em>
</p><p>
  <em>True or false, it may be</em>
</p><p>
  <em>She's still out to get me</em>
</p><p>
  <strong>--naive // the kooks</strong>
</p><p> </p><p>Leila’s having the dream again. </p><p> </p><p>It’s the one she keeps having, ever since the Patrice Joh mission--the one that gave her her healing ability. It’s not the kind of nightmare that wakes you up with a jolt, breathing hard and covered in a cold sweat. Leila’s been relatively successful at burying the demons that bring those dreams. </p><p> </p><p>No, this is the kind of bad dream that you have to peel yourself out of and scrape off your mind. The kind that leaves a kind of psychic residue for the rest of the day. The kind of dream that settles on your shoulders with you as you slip back into the waking world. </p><p> </p><p>She can never remember the details; they slip away as she wakes up and she’s left with nothing but the memory of sensory details. The smell of smoke, the acrid taste of it in her lungs. The satisfying, electric feeling of taking a new ability for the first time. The color pink, a bright white light, and always, always this medical beeping sound, steady, too steady, like the heart monitor of a brain-dead patient.  </p><p> </p><p>Except this time it’s ringing. Why is it ringing? That’s not right. It--</p><p> </p><p>Her eyes flutter open in realization to find her phone buzzing on the nightstand. </p><p> </p><p>She sits up and catches it on the last ring, with just a moment to glimpse the caller ID. </p><p> </p><p>“Agent Whittaker,” Fury says, before she can say anything. </p><p> </p><p>“Good morning, Director,” she says, unable to fully shake the annoyance from her voice. Not that she resents being woken up from that dream, especially, but she does resent being woken up this early in general. Which is not really fair to Fury--waking her up when he needs her is, in fact, well within his rights as her boss--</p><p> </p><p>That’s another thing. She usually gets the call from someone else. Hill, Brock Rumlow. Coulson, before he...well. The point is, if Fury’s contacting her directly, it must be important. </p><p> </p><p>“I have an assignment for you,” Fury says. </p><p> </p><p><em> You fucking better. </em> “And here I thought this was a social call.”</p><p> </p><p>“I want you to reach out to Captain Rogers and convince him to run some tests with us to see if we can replicate the super soldier serum.”</p><p> </p><p>“Have an intern do it.”</p><p> </p><p>“We also need you to copy those powers during those tests.”</p><p> </p><p>“Have an intern do that, too.” </p><p> </p><p>He scoffs. </p><p> </p><p>“Not to question your undoubtedly endless wisdom,” Leila says, “but why am I the designated Captain America Whisperer, exactly?”</p><p> </p><p>“Because I, in my <em> endless wisdom </em>, said so.”</p><p> </p><p>She sighs, running a hand through her hair. She shouldn’t be surprised. The day Fury explains any of his decisions to her is the same day hell freezes over. Which, incidentally, is the same day she manages to get Steve Rogers back onto the hamster wheel. </p><p> </p><p>“You realize he’s not going to want to submit to testing,” she says, as if she’s going to change his mind. “Historically, I’m told he didn’t especially enjoy being a lab rat. For some reason.”</p><p> </p><p>There’s a pause, and Leila can’t be sure, but she imagines Fury rolling his good eye. </p><p> </p><p>“Just make it happen, Agent,” he says. “You have 36 hours.” <em> Click </em>. </p><p> </p><p>She sighs and sets the phone down. </p><p> </p><p>“What’d Fury want?” Brock Rumlow asks, sitting up next to her.</p><p> </p><p>“You’re supposed to be asleep,” she tells him. </p><p> </p><p>“Then you should talk more quietly.”</p><p> </p><p>She looks over at him. He’s still propped up on the bed by his elbows, lazily blinking himself awake. Rumlow has <em> many </em>assets, as Leila’s learned over the past month, and her thin sheets are doing nothing to conceal them. </p><p> </p><p>God, Fury really does have shitty timing. </p><p> </p><p>She sighs, flopping back onto the bed dramatically. “Apparently I have to go talk Rogers into letting us run some labs.”</p><p> </p><p>He looks down at her and smiles. “Good luck with that, kid.”</p><p> </p>
<hr/><p><br/>
<br/>
</p><p>Leila doesn’t bother stopping at the address Fury sent her. If she’s right about Rogers, he’s going to be exactly where she found him the first time. </p><p> </p><p>She’s almost right. Gleason’s Gym is empty of customers when she gets there at ten, with no defrosted super soldiers in sight. The man she assumes owns the place tells her that Steve usually comes by at 10:30. And then again at 2:30, and then again at 8. Frankly, she’s surprised he ever leaves the place at all. When she was arguably in his position, she didn’t stop wanting to punch things for...God, at least a year. </p><p> </p><p>She could leave and come back, but she decides to wait. About five minutes in, she gets bored of her phone. So she takes off her jacket, jewelry, and heels, and starts wrapping her hands. </p><p> </p><p>Maybe she never really stopped wanting to punch things, after all.</p><p> </p>
<hr/><p> </p><p>Rogers comes in at 10:38. </p><p> </p><p>“You’re late,” Leila tells him without looking away from the punching bag. </p><p> </p><p>Rogers doesn’t seem especially fazed by her presence. “Sorry,” he quips, “did we have an appointment?”</p><p> </p><p>“Not one that you knew about,” she says, throwing one last punch. “So I’ll let it slide this time.”</p><p> </p><p>She turns to him, crossing her arms. He’s not letting her interrupt his routine; he’s already wrapping his hands, sitting on a bench by the wall when he looks up and asks, “so what’s the occasion?”</p><p> </p><p>“SHIELD wants you to come in for some tests,” she says. </p><p> </p><p>He’s not surprised by this, either. </p><p> </p><p>“Took you long enough,” he sighs, with a sort of weathered resignation. </p><p> </p><p>“Is that a yes?”</p><p> </p><p>“Haven’t I spent enough time as a lab rat?” he asks, glancing up at her. There’s that self-deprecating smile playing on his lips. If Steve Rogers takes himself as seriously as the rest of the world does, he puts on a good show of pretending not to do so. She smiles back a little. </p><p> </p><p>“Yeah,” she says, “but that was what, like eighty years ago?”</p><p> </p><p>“Seventy.”</p><p> </p><p>“Exactly. They say you should have a physical every year, so you’re seventy years behind.”</p><p> </p><p>Steve shakes his head. “I had one when they defrosted me,” he says, surprisingly nonchalant about the whole thing. “And you seem especially invested in my signing on,” he adds. </p><p> </p><p>“Fury gave me this mission personally. So if I don’t get you signed on, I’m letting him down. Which means if you say no, you’re making me let him down. So you’re letting him down. And he did fish you out of an iceberg.”</p><p> </p><p>“And in return I helped you save New York.”</p><p> </p><p>“Oh, just New York? Being modest, are we?”</p><p> </p><p>He looks down, and shakes his head, grinning, and finishes wrapping his hands before standing up. The movement is fluid, easy, but weighted somehow. He really does move like he’s carrying the heavens on his shoulders. It annoyed her before, but now she studies him as he stretches his arm behind his neck, looking for an in. </p><p> </p><p>“I’ll fight you for it,” she says impulsively. His arms drop to his side as he looks at her curiously. </p><p> </p><p>She gestures to the boxing ring behind her. “Sparring match, right now. If I win, you have to let SHIELD stick you with needles this Saturday. If you win, I’ll leave you alone and never darken your doorstep again.”</p><p> </p><p>“Really. Just like that.” He looks her over like he’s sizing her up. He’s considering it. </p><p> </p><p>Leila extends a hand, her small finger extended. “Pinky promise,” she says, with a smile and an ironic sort of innocence.</p><p> </p><p>He meets her eyes, and she wonders what he finds there that makes him shake his head and say “Alright.”</p><p> </p>
<hr/><p> </p><p>Despite having been woken early, Leila’s in a decent mood at that point, so when Steve offers her a hand up the stairs to the ring, she takes it. She ducks under the ropes to join him on the platform and rolls her shoulders in preparation. </p><p> </p><p>“So how’s this work?” Steve asks, handing her a pair of boxing gloves. “What are the ground rules?”</p><p> </p><p>“We do anything short of actually killing each other,” she replies, “and the first person to stay down for ten seconds loses.”</p><p> </p><p>“I thought you said you couldn’t die.”</p><p> </p><p>For a brief moment, her mind flashes back to Stuttgart, sitting up on the cool concrete, and that vast, empty darkness she’d come out of. </p><p> </p><p>She shakes it off and smiles. “Then I guess I’ll have to take it easy on you.”</p><p> </p>
<hr/><p><br/>
<br/>
“So,” Leila says, dodging Steve’s punch, “you still don’t trust SHIELD.”</p><p> </p><p>“Can you blame me?” Steve dodges Leila’s kick, making her lose her balance. She falls into a roll and stands up behind him, and gets in a kick to the small of his back before he can turn around. He stumbles into the ropes, but doesn’t fall.</p><p> </p><p>Ordinarily, she would’ve gone after him again before he could bounce back, but she’s more interested in reading him than she is in beating him. He’s seen her fight; he knows she can hold her own, and he knows she won’t hold back. Because he won’t go back on his word, and he knows that she’ll hold him to it. </p><p> </p><p>He won’t admit it to her, but he’s considering it. </p><p> </p><p>“Nope,” she says, popping the <em> p </em>at the end, and this, finally, surprises him, allowing her to get a punch in. She comes at him hard, and his head snaps back, only to turn back to her as if nothing happened. </p><p> </p><p>“I’m just saying, SHIELD isn’t all bad, you know,” Leila says, dodging another punch. “You’d be helping to catch a lot of bad guys.”</p><p> </p><p>“Such as?”</p><p> </p><p><em> Such as myself, </em>she thinks. </p><p> </p><p>“War criminals, terrorist cells,” she says instead. “Jaywalkers. You know, real sick sons-of-bitches.”</p><p> </p><p>“All that from a few tests, huh?”</p><p> </p><p>So he did catch her sleight of hand. Interesting. He doesn’t seem mad, though; he’s smirking at her realization. Entertained, but not any more guarded than he was. </p><p> </p><p>“You’d be surprised,” she says, and feints right. He moves to dodge and she hooks a foot behind his knee, and with a quick wrench she’s pulled his leg out from under him. He falls onto his back. </p><p> </p><p>She falls to her knees, one of which lands on his chest, keeping him pinned. He doesn’t fight her; he looks up at her like he’s trying to read her. <em> He doesn’t like having to do that.  </em></p><p> </p><p>“Cards on the table,” she says, pinning his hands to his side, and something in his eyes changes. Rogers might know how to recognize word games, but he clearly doesn’t like playing them. </p><p> </p><p>That has to be very boring for him, but it might work to her advantage here. </p><p> </p><p>“Fury isn’t asking for your hand in marriage. It’s one day. We run some tests, and you can keep thinking about whether you want to help us vis-a-vis aforementioned bad guys.”</p><p> </p><p>He looks up at her, studying her--they’re so close, she realizes, and breathing hard--and then suddenly breaks free of her grasp and flips them over, pinning her the way she had him moments ago. He’s not being nearly as rough with her and she was with him. Maybe because he’s a gentleman, but she thinks it’s also because he’s not fully committed to the competition. </p><p> </p><p>“You know, they tried to replicate the serum in the forties, too,” he says. </p><p> </p><p>She smiles up at him, vaguely impressed. She could try to break free, but she can already tell she’s won. </p><p> </p><p>“The forties didn’t have me.”</p><p> </p><p>Steve studies her one last moment and then releases her wrists and sits up. “Fine. I’m in.” He stands up and holds a hand out to her; she takes it and gets to her feet. </p><p> </p><p>She dusts herself off delicately and then steps under the ropes. “Fort Falsworth. 10 AM. This Saturday. We’ll send you the coordinates,” she says, grabbing her jacket off the bench. She pulls her earrings out of the pocket and looks back at him as she puts them on. He’s still studying her, trying to make sense of her. <em> Good luck, buddy.  </em></p><p> </p><p>She smiles. “Don’t be late this time.”</p><p> </p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
          <p>Hey everyone! Sorry for the delay in posting this, I've actually had this chapter done for awhile, it's just that I did not have the energy to edit and post due to a severe depressive episode. But I'm pulling out of it (knock on wood) and I'm excited to share this new storyline with you! This is an original plotline (meaning it doesn't follow any of the movies the way that Battle Royale followed The Avengers) and I'm both nervous and excited to write it. </p><p>MAD shout-out to <a href="https://harlowmerediths.tumblr.com/">harlowmerediths</a> for helping me give this chapter a heartbeat. I was really unhappy with it before her suggested edits, it felt flat to me, and I’m much happier with it now. </p><p>As always, I'd love to hear what you think! Opinions, concrit, predictions, any thoughts you have!</p><p>And lastly, I didn't realize this until I started posting but it's Valentine's Day, so happy Valentine's Day to you all. Love y'all. I'm scared to put a heart emoji cause I don't know what ao3 will do with it but just pretend it's there.</p>
        </blockquote></div></div>
<a name="section0002"><h2>2. Chapter 2</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Summary for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
            <p>Leila copies Steve's powers, and invites herself to a barbecue.</p>
          </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>Fort Falsworth is a SHIELD base a few miles outside of Saratoga Springs. Most of the tests Leila went through after her academy training took place there, but she hasn’t been back since. Maybe she should feel something--some nostalgia, or deja vu--but mostly she just wants to get the day over with.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>Getting inside seems to take almost as long as the three hour long ride from Manhattan, although it probably only takes about twenty minutes. It includes ID, a retinal scan, and a few code phrases. </p>
<p> </p>
<p>Finally, the last set of doors open and a SHIELD analyst leads her to an elevator that takes them to an underground floor. </p>
<p> </p>
<p>A wall of glass windows reveals a lab full of more SHIELD techs running around in white lab coats. “You can just head in,” the woman who led her there says, and Leila steps out of the elevator. </p>
<p> </p>
<p>It takes her a second to place the doors—everything is glass, perfectly clear, smooth, and indistinguishable. She’d be shocked to see a smudge anywhere. As soon as she walks in, Doctor Shirazi is there in front of her, looking at a clipboard as he speaks.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“Agent Whittaker, glad to have you here,” he says absently, like he’s reading from a mental script.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“Oh, not <em> nearly </em>as glad as I am to be here, I’m sure.”</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“We need to debrief you on your current powers before you go in with Rogers.” He sets a hand on her shoulder to guide her through a white side door. She shrugs his hand off, irritated, but follows his lead anyway. </p>
<p> </p>
<p>As she’s whisked away, she glances around one last time and sees Steve behind another glass door, sitting on a table looking utterly bored; Leila imagines he must be regretting his decision by now. </p>
<p> </p>
<p>He glances in her direction and double takes as he recognizes a familiar face before smiling in a resigned, sympathetic way. </p>
<p> </p>
<p>She smiles back, just a little. </p>
<p> </p>
<hr/>
<p> </p>
<p>It’s weird to have someone other than Lachlan doing her debriefing. Lachlan got a promotion shortly after hers to STRIKE, so he’s done every debriefing up ‘til now. The new analyst is all business, and the meeting takes only a few minutes before she’s led to a doctor’s office for a physical. </p>
<p> </p>
<p>It takes longer than usual; in addition to the power check, they need a “before” set of vitals and stats to compare to the “after” for when she copies Rogers’ powers. If all goes well, she’s about to become the second super soldier in history. Probably temporarily, but still--documentation is vital. </p>
<p> </p>
<p>Once they have what they need, she’s left alone to change into a black sports bra so they can hook a bunch of sensors to her. It’s annoying, but she supposes she should be grateful that SHIELD has wireless ones, that she’s not going to have to drag a computer with her everywhere. When they’re done, she’s left alone for a moment, and puts her shirt back on before hopping back onto the medical table, kicking her feet boredly. </p>
<p> </p>
<p>Finally, Shirazi comes back in. “Fury wants to talk to you before you go back out there.”</p>
<p> </p>
<p><em> What the hell does he want now? </em> she thinks.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>She doesn’t have to wait long; Fury enters less than a minute later. </p>
<p> </p>
<p>“Director,” she says. </p>
<p> </p>
<p>“Agent.” He steps forward, hands clasped behind his back. “Good of you to join us.”</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“I’m a very charitable person.” She leans back on her palms. “So what’s the story, Morning Glory?”</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“I told you I wanted you to copy Captain Rogers’ powers and test them out.”</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“I know, I was there.”</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“Yeah, I remember. Here’s what I didn’t tell you: Rogers is on the fence about joining SHIELD. I want you to fix that.”</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“Sure, I’d love to talk him out of joining SHIELD.”</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“Try again.”</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“Sure, I’d love to talk him into joining SHIELD.”</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“That’s better.”</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“Why am I being, uh, honored by this mission?” Leila asks just as Fury starts to leave. “I thought I was prickly.”</p>
<p> </p>
<p>Fury stops with his hand on the door, turns, and looks at her, and he’s doing that almost smile thing he does sometimes. “When,” he asks, “are you going to let that go?”</p>
<p> </p>
<p>He leaves without answering her question. </p>
<p>
  <br/>
  <br/>
</p>
<hr/>
<p> </p>
<p>Leila is still thinking this over as she heads back into the lab with Shirazi. It’s not that she has qualms about being manipulative, but Rogers has not, as of yet, struck her as someone easily manipulated. He’s also coming from a place of already distrusting SHIELD, after the Phase 2 debacle; she’d be surprised if he’s forgiven them already. </p>
<p> </p>
<p>So what’s her angle?</p>
<p> </p>
<p>Rogers is a good guy. And she’s pretty sure SHIELD are the good guys, or as close to the good guys as any large entity ever is, primarily by the fact that she had to be coerced into working for them. If she’d gone in willingly--well, it wouldn’t have been a positive statement on SHIELD. </p>
<p> </p>
<p>She sighs, hitting the button on the elevator. </p>
<p> </p>
<p>Rogers wants to do the right thing. If she can convince him that SHIELD will help him do that, he’ll join. </p>
<p> </p>
<p>Which means she needs to give him examples of SHIELD’s do-gooding. But it’s not like she can just make him a powerpoint presentation. And she can’t go around trying to slip it into casual conversation unless she’s very careful about it; he’ll catch it, he’ll feel manipulated, and that’s one more wall she’ll have to tear down. </p>
<p> </p>
<p>She could do that thing where she drops a single piece of information about a case, then refuses to go into further detail until he pushes her for it. But the problem is that he knows about her indifference to SHIELD protocol; he won’t buy her sudden desire to hide intelligence from the most trustworthy man in America. Again, it comes back to not letting him see what she’s doing. Manipulating without being perceived as manipulative. </p>
<p> </p>
<p>Honestly, maybe the powerpoint thing isn’t such a bad idea. At least it’s straight-forward, which he might respect. </p>
<p> </p>
<p>She sighs as the elevator doors slide open, and sets it all aside. She doesn’t have time to strategize; for now, all she can do is play it by ear. </p>
<p> </p>
<hr/>
<p> </p>
<p>When Leila reenters the lab, Rogers is still sitting on the medical table, still looking bored, but shirtless this time, with the same kind of sensors stuck on his chest that she does.  </p>
<p> </p>
<p>By all historical record, the first thing Peggy Carter did upon Steve Rogers’ exit from the metal tube they put him in to administer the serum was to reach out and touch his chest. Given that context, Leila can’t muster up a lot of guilt for letting her eyes glance over him briefly as she enters the room. </p>
<p> </p>
<p>Still, she tries to be subtle about it, if only for Steve’s sake, and when she steps closer to him, she gives him a heads up. </p>
<p> </p>
<p>“Don’t make it weird,” she instructs him, “but it works better if I touch your chest, with direct skin to skin contact.”</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“I thought it was the heart or the head,” he says. </p>
<p> </p>
<p>“That’s just what I say when I can’t reach the heart,” she replies. “Head is just a runner-up.”</p>
<p> </p>
<p>With that, she rests her palms on his chest and reaches out. There’s the little jolt she feels when she connects, sort of like the way a plug can spark if you aren’t fast enough in plugging it in, and then the synesthesia sets in. She sees colors, <em> feels </em>them, and intuitively, she knows which one she’s looking for--this one a deep ocean blue. She sifts through a rainbow of DNA until she finds what she’s looking for and takes it for herself. </p>
<p> </p>
<p>Then she opens her eyes and sees white as the colors disappear before the world comes back into focus. </p>
<p> </p>
<p>“That was quick,” Steve says as she lets her hands drop to her sides. </p>
<p> </p>
<p>Copying someone’s powers always feels like it takes a few minutes, but most of the time it only takes about a second. </p>
<p> </p>
<p>“I mean, if you want me to spend longer touching your chest, all you have to do is ask.” She smirks, and he does that wry half-smile she’s come to associate with him. He shakes his head, but she can see him blushing just slightly. </p>
<p> </p>
<p>“I’ll keep you posted on that,” he deadpans. </p>
<p> </p>
<p>“Please do,” she replies. </p>
<p> </p>
<p>“No visible changes,” Shirazi says, still looking at his clipboard, and she finds herself irritated at him for interrupting their conversation. Rapport is important in recruitment. “Interesting.”</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“How do you feel?” Steve asks. </p>
<p> </p>
<p>“Not that different,” she admits. “But I wasn’t a huge nerd pre-super-soldier-ism, so.”</p>
<p> </p>
<p>He rolls his eyes. “Maybe not on the outside.”</p>
<p> </p>
<p>She blinks in surprise, and then grins slowly. “Ouch,” she says. “Okay, point one: Cap.”</p>
<p> </p>
<p>With that, Doctor Shizari takes her arm and gently leads her away. “We need another physical,” he says as she shrugs him off again.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>When she glances back at Steve, he’s still smiling a little. </p>
<p>
  <br/>
  <br/>
</p>
<hr/>
<p> </p>
<p>None of her vitals are drastically different. Her heart rate has raised just a bit--Shirazi says it’s likely to be to accomodate a higher metabolism--and her muscles feel more loose somehow, like she’s just run a marathon. The flexibility of a post-workout high without the exhaustion. Nice. Her vision has gone from 20/20 to 20/10, although the difference seems negligible in the stark white office. Otherwise, she feels pretty normal.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>Once the physical is over, it’s time for the super-soldier olympics. </p>
<p> </p>
<p> </p>
<hr/>
<p>
  <br/>
  <br/>
</p>
<p>“Keep up, old man!”</p>
<p> </p>
<p>Before copying the serum, Leila was already in above-average physical shape; her job is a physical one, and it’s in her own best interest to stay at the top of her game. </p>
<p> </p>
<p>The top of her game has just gotten higher, much higher. Frankly, she didn’t expect much of an experience; most of the abilities she uses regularly are just bits and pieces of the serum, anyway. Enhanced agility, enhanced flexibility, enhanced strength. </p>
<p> </p>
<p>At least, she thought they were enhanced. They’re child’s play to what she’s feeling now. She’s stronger than she’s ever been, more gymnastic, and <em> so </em> much faster, it almost feels like she’s flying, like she’s wearing the <em> talaria </em>that Hermes used to get around in Orphic Hymns. </p>
<p> </p>
<p>And her senses are heightened. Not just her vision, although the change there is more noticeable now, too. She’s acutely aware of everything--the sun beating down on her out on Fort Falsworth’s track, the strange mechanical smell that permeates everything about the place, and every rock that finds its way under her shoes. </p>
<p> </p>
<p>It’s supposed to be temporary, but she never wants to give it up. </p>
<p> </p>
<p>This is their third competition. Steve’s won both of them so far, which is annoying, but she’s too ecstatic at this new power to care. Sure, she’s sweaty and gross and would never run in the sun of her own accord, but it’s a fair trade-off for the moment. </p>
<p> </p>
<p>Steve wins the race, but only narrowly this time, and they collapse onto the grass beside the track. </p>
<p> </p>
<p>“Good game,” he says, holding out a hand, like it’s an instinct, and she smiles and takes it. </p>
<p> </p>
<p>“Someday I’m gonna kick your ass,” she says by way of response, and he laughs. </p>
<p> </p>
<p>“Too bad you didn’t. Would’ve made for a good story.”</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“Who do you tell stories to, Rogers?” </p>
<p> </p>
<p>“It’s--” he looks away, staring into the distance, thoughtfully. “There’s this barbeque next week. It’s for Howling Commandos and family. Apparently they do it every year. My invitation came in the mail two days ago.”</p>
<p> </p>
<p>She nods. She’s heard of this, vaguely, from an old classmate. </p>
<p>“Are you gonna go?”</p>
<p>“I mean, I guess I should, right?”</p>
<p>“Yeah, obviously. But that’s not what I asked.”</p>
<p>The question isn’t if he should go, but it’s not really if he will go, either. The question is if he wants to. One would imagine he’d jump at the chance to see his old friends again, but apparently he has mixed-to-negative feelings about it. He’s reclusive. Introverted. Relatable, but it does make her job harder. </p>
<p> </p>
<p>“Take me with you,” she says impulsively. </p>
<p> </p>
<p>He looks over at her, and she’s almost surprised to see a flicker of...interest? Hope? In his eyes. “You?”</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“Yeah. You can lie and pretend we’re…”</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“Dating?”</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“I was gonna say friends,” she smirks, and he grins. </p>
<p> </p>
<p>“Walked into that one,” he mutters. “Why the sudden interest?” Despite his lighthearted tone, she knows he’s a little suspicious.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>Luckily, she doesn’t have to lie. </p>
<p> </p>
<p>“I’ve always wanted to meet Galina Kovaleva.”</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
          <p>Hey everyone! So it’s been pretty wild out there lately, I hope you’re all doing well, taking care of yourselves, and practicing social distancing. </p>
<p>Sorry for the delay, I got distracted by writing <a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/23200909/chapters/55540360">this Snowcap AU,</a> which you are welcome but not obligated to check out. (It does contain spoilers for the main fic.)</p>
<p> I do have some good news; I have most of the rest of this plotline written out, and I’m planning on updating every Friday for the rest of it! While I’m updating I’ll also be working on future chapters, so hopefully I can get ahead of things and get on a regular posting schedule! </p>
<p>Lastly, as usual, I’d love to hear any thoughts you have on this chapter!</p>
        </blockquote></div></div>
<a name="section0003"><h2>3. Chapter 3</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>
  <em>
    <span>In 1943, when Steve Rogers liberated the 107th from the Hydra compound, he met one of the few female active combat soldiers of the war. While most countries had not yet decided to allow women into active combat roles, the USSR had allowed it since the first World War, paving the way for Galina Kovaleva--known as Kova to her compatriots--to become the only female member of Captain Rogers’ Howling Commandos, and one of the most well-known wartime snipers in modern history.</span>
  </em>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <b>
    <em>Click. </em>
  </b>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>Leila turns off the documentary as she’s getting dressed. She’d turned it on to see if it would be enlightening in any way re: project recruit Steve Rogers, but it turns out she’s seen it too many times to glean anything new out of it. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>She chooses her outfit carefully for the barbeque. Usually, she wears whatever the hell she feels like on that particular day (it’s always black; the variable depends on whether there’s other color involved and how much skin is exposed), but this is a performance. Steve’s going to be looking for any sign that he’s being manipulated, even if he doesn’t notice himself doing it. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>Which means she can’t look too hot, but she can’t look too reserved, either. Steve knows how she dresses, and if he notices her diverge from what he’s come to expect, he might put two and two together and know that she’s trying to be seen as innocuous. Which is something people only do when they aren’t.  </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>(Assuming he notices what she’s wearing at all. Straight men aren’t known for their attention to detail when it comes to clothing, but given her objective, she can’t be too careful. Besides which, given the rumors about Steve Rogers and Bucky Barnes, she’s not entirely convinced he’s straight, anyway.)</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>The weather is supposed to be moderate, so she chooses a black turtleneck tucked into a plaid skirt, leggings, and knee-high boots. Simple enough to look like something she just threw together for the look, involved enough to indicate that she cares about the look to begin with. (Which is true under the best of circumstances. She’s always been a slave to aesthetics.)</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>She expects Steve to call her from the car when he arrives. Instead, she hears a knock at the door. Old-fashioned. Kind of charming. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“If I’d known you lived in Manhattan, I wouldn’t have invited you,” Steve deadpans by way of greeting, and she smirks.</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“Well, you’re locked into it now,” she says. “You ready to introduce me to all your cool friends?”</span>
</p><p> </p><hr/><p> </p><p>
  <span>Leila had considered suggesting they ride motorcycles up to the park--it’s something they have in common, another potential advantage--but had decided against it just for the practicality of it. Instead, she lets him drive (it’s his event, after all, even if she doesn’t particularly like being driven places). His car is like his knocking, a charmingly old-fashioned thing, small, but noticeably different. He opens the passenger door for her. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>She finds herself intrigued by the car, and wonders what the engine looks like. “I’m driving home,” she tells (not asks) him as he gets behind the wheel, and he smiles. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“We’ll see, Manhattan,” he says, glancing up at her apartment, and she smirks. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“I guess we will, Brooklyn.”</span>
</p><p> </p><hr/><p>
  <br/>
  <br/>
</p><p>
  <span>Off the top of her head, Leila knows of two Howling Commando legacies who currently work for SHIELD. A further background check indicates that those are the only two likely to be in attendance. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>One of them is Vira Kovaleva, one of the few people Leila remembers from the academy. Leila never really connected with anyone there, so she doesn’t remember most of them, and Vira wasn’t even in the same school as Leila (she was in Communications, while Leila was in Operations), but she managed to make an impression via her bubbly disposition, anyway. Leila might be biased, but she feels like it should be illegal to like hugs that much at spy school. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>The other is Sharon Carter, and Leila decides to make her Plan A. Granted, Leila doesn’t know Sharon so much as know </span>
  <em>
    <span>of </span>
  </em>
  <span>her--they’ve only met a few times, and only in passing--but everything she’s heard about her speaks to someone who could be the key to changing Rogers’ mind about SHIELD. The niece of the woman he apparently loved, who also happens to exude integrity almost as much as he does--the perfect beacon to get SHIELD back into his good graces. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>Sharon Carter, she finds out quickly upon arrival,  is not in attendance. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>Vira Kovaleva it is. </span>
</p><p> </p><hr/><p> </p><p>
  <span>Leila lets Steve mingle for a while before reeling him back in to meet Vira. Partly because introducing him right off the bat would be too obvious, and partly because it’s the nice thing to do, and while she doesn’t have any moral investment in kindness, she does have a practical one, in this situation. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>Galina isn’t in attendance that year, she finds out quickly, so she mostly just sits on a bench and lets Steve do his thing, glancing up from her phone every so often to check on him. It’s a strange </span>
  <em>
    <span>je ne sais quoi</span>
  </em>
  <span> that’s taken over him here. Reconnecting with the closest thing he has to living family, while surrounded by monuments to the lives they lived while he was gone--she can read the contradiction in his posture, in his eyes. He’s more alive than she’s ever seen him, but the melancholy he carries with him is heavier, more bitter. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>Still, every time she looks up he’s generally smiling, so he can’t be having too bad of a time. She doesn’t notice herself smiling until he catches her eye and smiles back at her. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>She looks back down at her phone, but can’t make her smile disappear completely.</span>
</p><p> </p><hr/><p>
  <br/>
  <br/>
</p><p>
  <span>“There’s someone I want you to meet,” Leila tells him an hour later, when he sits next to her on the bench. She doesn’t bother with any ‘oh, I just realized’ bullshit. He’ll see right through it, and it won’t get her anywhere. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>He raises an eyebrow, looking guarded. “Oh, really?”</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“Mhm. You know how I said I wanted to meet Galina?”</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“Yeah. She’s not here, though,” he says, sounding both apologetic and disappointed. She doesn’t feel the urge to put a reassuring hand on his shoulder, exactly, but she does notice that he has the exact right posture for such a gesture. She ignores the thought. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“Yeah. Well, I think if she was, she’d want you to meet her granddaughter.”</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“Granddaughter?” Something lights up in his eyes again, some mixture of sadness and hope. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“Her name’s Vira. I think you’d like her.” Unlike Leila, Vira isn’t as involved in espionage; she’s one of SHIELD’s psychiatrists, and Leila imagines her genuineness is something Steve will appreciate. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>Vira isn’t hard to track down. She’s always been something of a social butterfly; all Leila has to do is follow the sound of raucous laughter to find Vira standing near a grill, listening to one of the other legacies tell a story. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>Leila doesn’t bother to wait for a breaking point in the conversation. “Vira,” she calls from a few yards away. (She would default to her last name, but she’s not sure how many Kovalevas there are outside of Vira, if any.)</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>Vira looks up and her eyes light up. She excuses herself and then launches into a hug, throwing her arms around Leila. Leila doesn’t quite hug back, but pats Vira’s back awkwardly. If this offends her, she doesn’t show it. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“Leila!” Vira says excitedly, her Russian accent coming through at full force. “How are you? Why are you here? Oh my God, New York--”</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“I’m fine. New York is also fine. I’m here to introduce you to someone.” </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>Vira steps back and glances around before her eyes land on Steve, who’s looking distinctly amused. Part of her wants to slap the smile right off his face; the other part wants to smile back. Vira’s eyes widen, and she seems at a loss for words. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“Hi,” Steve says, extending a hand. “I’m Steve.”</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“I know who you are,” Vira says, and then blushes. “I--my grandmother told me about you.”</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>Steve nods. “I’m sure she chose the most embarrassing stories possible.”</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“Nope. Only the good,” Vira says, but Leila can tell she’s lying. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>Leila takes a step back as Steve and Vira talk. Again, she’s struck by how (comparatively) lively Steve is in this environment, like some dormant part of him has come alive. She remembers the theory about how when you meet someone you knew a long time ago, you revert to the person you were when you knew them, and wonders vaguely if there’s some variation of that going on--and, more importantly, if she can use it to her advantage. As far as she can tell, it’s a neutral thing, but she keeps it in the back of her mind for future reference, anyway. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>Their conversation is interrupted by Vira’s phone ringing; she apologizes profusely and steps away to answer it. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“You’re awful quiet, Whittaker,” Steve says, and again, there’s that thin note of suspicion under his good nature, like he knows what she was thinking. Unsettling. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>Before she has to answer, Vira comes back over, her face having gone pale. “I--”</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>She doesn’t get the chance to speak before the explosion hits. </span>
</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
          <p>Vira's faceclaim is Emily Ratajkowski. Still deciding on Galina's (both young and old.)</p>
        </blockquote></div></div>
<a name="section0004"><h2>4. Chapter 4</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Summary for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
            <p>Steve and Leila begin to investigate the bombing, and find their first big clue.</p>
          </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>
  <span>There’s actually something kind of fun about getting knocked off your feet by an explosion. Her abilities minimize the pain of the impact, so most of what she feels is flying backwards through the air. It’s fun in the way a rollercoaster is fun, if immediately upon getting off the rollercoaster you had to go into the office and work overtime. Because funnily enough, she’s never been knocked off her feet by an explosion and then just gotten to walk away. There’s always work to be done when she stands back up. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>She gets back to her feet and holds a hand out to Vira, who takes it. Steve’s several yards away, already back on his feet and running to the sidewalk to get a closer look at the explosion across the street. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>She immediately notices something off about it. The explosion was powerful enough to knock them off their feet, but not enough to destroy the building itself. There’s damage to it--enough that they can see that that’s where the explosion originated--but it’s still mostly standing. Voices scream from inside the building, terrified, and Steve takes off running. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>Leila sighs and follows after him. Vira arrives a few moments after they do. Crossing the street isn’t far enough for her to fall far behind, but Leila’s still holding onto the super-soldier serum, so the heels on her boots only slow her down behind Steve slightly. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>Steve runs directly into the building, no hesitation, while Leila turns to Vira. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“Call SHIELD,” she says. “They should know about this.”</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“That’s what I’ve been trying to tell you,” Vira says. “The call I got. It was a warning.”</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“What did they say?”</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>Vira takes a moment, like she’s preparing herself. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“They said ‘this is only the beginning.’”</span>
</p><p>
  <br/>
  <br/>
</p><hr/><p> </p><p>
  <span>“Vira,” Leila says, after all the civilians have been ushered out, “can you handle the picnic?”</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“I’ve handled worse,” she says, and heads across the street. Leila turns back to Steve, hovering near the door of the library.  </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“This shouldn’t be possible. The explosion was too controlled.”</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“You didn’t find a second site?” Steve asks, as if that’s not the first thing she would’ve told him upon returning from looking for one. She was going to stay and help with the civilians, but that’s the thing--it really wasn’t a two-person job. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“No. It had to have come from here.”</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“So how’d it knock us off our feet from across the street and yet not kill a single person inside the building?”</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>Leila closes her eyes for a moment, thoughtfully. “Vira got a call right before the explosion hit. Voice was pitched, but apparently they said ‘this is only the beginning’ before hanging up.”</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“So there could be another bomb about to go off at any moment,” Steve says. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“Exactly.”</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“And if the bomber could figure out how to rig this--” he gestures to the library-- “they could also figure out how to rig something bigger and deadlier.”</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>She nods. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“Only question is,” he continues, “why would they? If they were going to kill people, why not do it now?”</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“Theatrics,” Leila says. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“Or attention.”</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“Same bitch,” Leila shrugs. “Vira called SHIELD. No answer.”</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“So what do we do in the meantime?”</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“We keep trying to get in touch and wait for further intel. SHIELD has the best hackers on the planet, aside from maybe Stark, and there has to be a digital trail behind this.”</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“No. We need to act now,” Steve says, and he’s not being dramatic about it--the shift into Captain mode is seamless and almost unnoticeable--but she could swear she’s never seen anyone with that much conviction before. “Before more people get hurt.”</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>Leila considers this for a moment. On the one hand, it’s definitely against SHIELD protocol, and she hasn’t been given authorization to act. The reason intelligence exists is because when you go in without all the answers, sometimes you make things worse instead of better. And while she’s pretty sure her newfound status as an Avenger has given her some extra leeway on the leash SHIELD has her on, she’d rather not take the risk of getting locked up. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>On the other hand, she knows that Steve is going to act no matter what she says, and the optics of her sitting on her ass while he does that is not going to win any favors from him, for her or for SHIELD. And surely trying to follow a direct order from Fury himself outweighs following protocol, right?</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>There’s a third, smaller factor, which is her own curiosity about the case, and as something shiny and black catches her eye on the ground, it becomes the deciding factor. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“Fine,” she says finally. “Executive decision. This is officially a SHIELD case.”</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“You have that authority?”</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“I mean, no one’s specifically told me I </span>
  <em>
    <span>don’t</span>
  </em>
  <span>,” she replies. “Now shut up.”</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“Why--” he starts, but she waves a hand and follows the gleam of light to a piece of metal just inside the broken doorway, barely visible under the debris. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“I think I know how they controlled the explosion,” she says, her fears confirmed, and pulls the metal out from under the wreckage, dusting it off. It’s about 8-by-5, and definitely metal, but beetle-black and scaly, and still warm from whatever it was just used for. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>She holds it up for Steve to see, and he recognizes it immediately. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“They have Chitauri tech.”</span>
</p><p> </p><hr/><p>
  <br/>
  <br/>
</p><p>
  <span>“Did we see any explosions like that during the battle?”</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“There was a lot going on, I wasn’t paying attention to explosion patterns.”</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“Me either,” she says with a sigh. “But it has to at least hypothetically be possible to direct the vibrations of an explosion like that. I mean, we saw what they were capable of. It can’t be a coincidence.”</span>
  <span>
    <br/>
    <br/>
  </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“So how’d the bomber get access to alien technology?”</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“I mean, you said it, Cap. It was a big mess. Fuck, there’s still probably chitauri leftovers floating around the black market.”</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“Fantastic.”</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“I know.”</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“What about the call? Can we track him that way?”</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“If we had SHIELD analysts on our team, maybe. I’ll ask Vira to go through people who might have her number, but it’s more likely they managed to hack one of the lower security SHIELD databases.”</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“So there’s basically no way to trace this guy?”</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“I didn’t say that.” She turns back to the library. “And don’t assume it’s a guy.”</span>
</p><p>
  <br/>
  <br/>
</p><hr/><p> </p><p>
  <span>It’s a guy. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>Hacking isn’t Leila’s strongest ability, but she’s decent at it, and while most of the public computers in the library are damaged, the head librarian is all too willing to let them borrow one of the private ones, once Leila flashes her a badge. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>She can’t see a lot about the guy--she checks both the city’s cameras outside and the library’s indoor security cameras--but she can tell it’s most likely a man, probably on the shorter side but not short. It’s always infuriating how effective a baseball cap can be. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“So that was useless,” Leila says irritably, turning around in the swivel chair. Steve steps back to dodge her just barely. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“At least we ruled out half the population,” he says. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“</span>
  <em>
    <span>Probably</span>
  </em>
  <span>. Not definitively.”</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>He doesn’t argue. “So now what?”</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“Now we profile.” She keeps spinning in the chair; it’s helping her think, weirdly. “People set off bombs for three main reasons. He didn’t kill anyone. In fact, he went out of his way not to kill anyone.”</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“Good for him.”</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“And he wasn’t trying to be a hero, otherwise he wouldn’t have left the scene and not come back.”</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“So that means he was trying to send a message,” Steve adds. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“We just don’t know what.”</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“Which means he’ll have to do it again. Try to make his point louder this time.”</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“We just don’t know when or where.”</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>Working it out with him out loud feels natural, almost too natural. It doesn’t even feel like a conversation; more like a stream of consciousness. Every time she has a thought, he voices it. It reminds her of how she felt in the quinjet on the way to Germany, this odd feeling of being on the exact same wavelength as a stranger. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>Steve’s not quite a stranger anymore, but they aren’t, like, friends, although she doesn’t know if he’d say describe it that way. It’s a little unsettling, but it’s also sort of thrilling, and it probably doesn’t say anything good that connecting with another human is so foreign that it feels good to talk about a bomb threat, but she sets that aside for now. She’s never been under the impression that her particular form of introversion is healthy; it’s not news. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“Steve,” she says, “what are the odds that he’d set off a bomb--”</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“Right across the street from the Howling Commandos family reunion?” he finishes. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“Which only meets once a year?”</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“I’d say not good. He wanted our attention.”</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“He wanted </span>
  <em>
    <span>your </span>
  </em>
  <span>attention. No one knew I was gonna be here. Unless you were bragging about it, which is understandable.”</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>He rolls his eyes, but she can see a smile tugging at his lips. “Okay. What’d he want my attention for? What did he think was gonna happen?”</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“I mean, he knew you’d get involved. It </span>
  <em>
    <span>is </span>
  </em>
  <span>your brand.”</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“Okay, but why me, specifically?”</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“Have you managed to piss anyone off in the five minutes you’ve been awake?”</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“Enough to make them set off a bomb? Not to my knowledge.”</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>Leila thinks on this, spinning faster. “Then I don’t know,” she says finally, annoyed at her own lack of conclusion. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>There’s a silence in the room for a moment. There’s an ace in the hole she can use, but she’s not supposed to use it without authorization unless it’s an absolute emergency. She doesn’t think it is, yet, but doing it might reflect well on SHIELD for Steve--</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>Before she can finish her train of thought, Vira comes in, followed by the head librarian, both ashen. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“You’re going to want to see this,” Vira says. </span>
</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
          <p>Hey everyone! Sorry, I know it's been longer than I said it'd be. A lot of crazy stuff's been happening IRL that's kept me busy. How are you all?</p><p>Some updates for you: I don't remember if I said this, but I have a blog for this fic specifically now, which you can find here. Also, I recently decided to (tentatively) change Leila's faceclaim from Nina Dobrev to Inbar Lavi. You are all, of course, welcome to picture her however you like; I've just found that Inbar matches my image of Leila closer than Nina. </p><p>Thank you to everyone who left reviews, it really and truly means the world to me. Love you guys!</p>
        </blockquote></div></div>
<a name="section0005"><h2>5. Chapter 5</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Summary for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
            <p>Steve and Leila visit a crime scene and then go on a road trip.</p>
          </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>
  <span>While Steve drives to the bank across town, Leila continues to watch and rewatch the video footage of the gas attack on her phone, occasionally stopping to text or call her SHIELD contacts. Sitwell, Rumlow, even Foreman--none of them are picking up. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>This isn’t unusual. Despite declaring it a SHIELD case, it’s not on file, and they have no reason to believe her calls are as important as they are. Hell, it’s more than possible that whatever they’re working on is more important than this, given the lack of a body count so far. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>It’s still annoying. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>Steve careens into the parking lot, taking the first spot available. When a cop comes over to tell them to leave, this time Leila doesn’t even have to flash him a badge; he just recognizes Steve, and stops mid-sentence, stuttering out a “sorry, Captain.”</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>Leila does get stopped at the yellow tape, though. They let Steve in instantly, but they make her show her badge, which is vaguely irritating time-wise but a relief in the big picture. Leila doesn’t want to be recognizable. Even in the aftermath of helping to save the world, apparently she’s not. Thank God for white male privilege. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>She foregoes her SHIELD credentials in favor of the fake CIA creds she uses for smaller cases. SHIELD’s become slightly more well known in the aftermath of the chitauri attack, but it still doesn’t carry the same recognizability as the CIA or FBI, and the smaller organizations don’t tend to invite as many questions. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>Most people prefer the FBI creds--they drew less attention--but Leila tends towards the CIA. A lot of cops, she’s found, have some kind of inferiority complex about the FBI. The CIA draws less hostility. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>Once they get into the bank, she lets Steve investigate the room while she goes to the computers. So far, the officer in charge tells her, there haven’t been any casualties; none of the people in the bank seem sick or injured. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>She watches the security camera footage as the bank, operating normally, suddenly fills with a thick, noxious-looking green miasma, and people begin to drop. It looks like a massacre, but if she looks closely enough--turns up her rapid learning ability and uses a zoom-in tool on her attention span--she can see that the officer is right. Everyone around her is breathing, and some of them are even moving, twitching in their unconsciousness. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“Do we know how long they’ll be out?”</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“Not yet,” Officer Bradley says. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“Where was the source of the gas found?”</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>Bradley points to a few vents in turn. “There, there and there. Right inside the grates.”</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“Thanks,” Leila mutters, and the officer goes on her way. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>She turns back to the security cameras, singling out the ones that point to somewhere someone could get access to the vents. Her rapid learning is still awake (that’s the best way she can think to put it; it’s never fully off or not there, but sometimes she can set it aside, and sometimes, like now, she lets it take over) and yet, even watching all four camera feeds at once, she can’t find anyone who was there--</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>She looks up to find Steve talking to some CSI guy holding what has to be one of the explosives. There’s a black rectangle on it, blank now, but she recognizes it as a digital clock. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>She turns back to the security cameras and goes back further, to the day before, and the day before that, and then--there. Three days ago, an hour before opening, she sees a guy behind the building in a ball cap. He flashes a badge under a card reader by the door, and it swings open. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>For a brief moment, Leila’s ready to find someone to ask about bank employees, but then she sees him walk down the hallway, through motion sensors that are very much still on. She switches her attention to the next camera. He approaches a door that looks like it should be impenetrable--it’s got several locks and another card reader outside--but he opens it and strolls through like it’s nothing. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>She watches him go on like that, making his way around the bank like he owns it while nothing that should stop him does, and leaves three detonators, each one in a different vent, before leaving the way he came. She swears if the cameras had audio, she’d hear him whistling. </span>
</p><p>
  <br/>
  <br/>
</p><p>
  <span>The last appearance he makes is right after he leaves. She sees him again, in the same spot behind the building where he entered, except this time--this time, he stops. Before he disappears back into the shadows outside of the camera’s view, he stops, takes off his hat, looks directly up into the camera, and smiles. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>One half of her brain starts putting that together: he wants them to know who he is. He wanted his identity to stay secret only up until this point. He wants attention, he wants fame, but he also wants time. That combined with the timer on the gas bombs--whatever his endgame is, he’s got a huge head start on it. He probably left for it immediately after leaving the library. He even set the gas bombs to go off after the exact amount of time it takes to travel between the library and the bank. The attention to detail indicates an organized criminal, not a disorganized one. He’s not doing this because the voices are telling him to. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>The other half of her brain snaps the back off her phone and pulls out a tiny chip. Her ace in the hole. She’s not sure if it’s an emergency yet, but no one’s answering her calls. She’s on her own here, except Steve, and they need all the help they can get. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>She sticks the chip into the back of the computer and waits for a moment as SHIELD’s OS takes control. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“What did you find?” Steve asks suddenly. There’s this spooky thing the rapid learning does sometimes, where it notices something without her noticing herself noticing it. She’s not surprised that he’s there now, but there’s a small part of her that’s a little surprised at the lack of surprise. It’s kind of circular, but it’s still more on her toes than she’d be able to be otherwise, so whatever. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“I found our guy,” she says, gesturing to the face on the screen. “And now I’m finding out who he is.”</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>It’s not the entirety of SHIELD’s intelligence files that the chip carries--even if they trusted her that much, it’d be way too dangerous to carry around in her day to day life, even without the five different passwords it requires to get in. But it’s a minimized version of it, for moments like this. Emergencies when no one’s answering. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“Felix Harker,” Leila says when the name pops up a moment later. “He’s been on a SHIELD watchlist since he was sixteen.”</span>
  <span>
    <br/>
    <br/>
  </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“As a prospective bomber?”</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“No, as a potential recruit. Weighted 5.0 GPA in high school, tons of science fair medals and trophies, graduated two years early, was all set to go to MIT.”</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“Then what?”</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“Drunk driving incident got his scholarship taken away. He couldn’t afford to attend, ended up at community college instead...now he works as a science teacher at Midtown High in Queens.”</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“So what’s his endgame?”</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“The bombs were installed two days ago. He wanted to stall us. He wanted us to see him on the library camera, then come here instead of go wherever he’s going. And he wanted you, specifically, to make sure the Avengers were doing something else. Which means he’s got a little bit of a God complex if he thinks this is an Avengers level threat.”</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“I’m sure it would be if Fury decided it was,” Steve replies bitterly, but Leila doesn’t have the energy to respond. The rapid learning is starting to get to her. If she can just figure out--</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“Midtown,” she says, as the search pops up. “They’re having their science fair tonight.” </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“Why would he blow up a high school science fair?” Steve asks skeptically.</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“Midtown High isn’t a normal high school. It’s a private school focusing on the sciences. These kids are future MIT grads.”</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“Everything he wanted to be,” Steve says. “We need to go.” He starts to leave, setting a hand on her shoulder, but she stumbles forward, grabbing the desk for balance. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“Hey--” Steve rushes to her side. “Are you okay?”</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“Don’t you fucking dare pick me up,” she says by way of response. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“So you can’t be doing too bad.” </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>She sets a hand on his shoulder and peels herself off the desk. “I’ll explain in the car. We’re going to Midtown.”</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“But--”</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“You’re driving.” </span>
</p><p> </p><hr/><p>
  <br/>
  <br/>
</p><p>
  <span>“Okay,” Steve says as he pulls onto the highway, “explain.”</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>She really doesn’t want to, honestly--she’d rather just take a nap--but she also knows that he’s not going to back down unless she gives him something. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“So one of the abilities I tend to keep on me is rapid learning.”</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“Okay.”</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“That’s what SHIELD calls it, but it’s really more like rapid thinking, in general. I pick up details and put them together quicker than most people, when I’m using it.”</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“You’re not always using it?”</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“No. I can sort of...turn it on and off. It’s always there, it’s sort of--do you have a computer?”</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>He glances at her, looking annoyed and amused at the same time. “Yes, Whittaker. I have a computer.”</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“I mean a real one, not the moon landing one that took up a whole room. Oh, we landed on the moon, by the way.”</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“It’s a laptop. We can’t all live on the upper east side and have big spare rooms, Manhattan.”</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>She looks out the window to hide her grin. “Okay. So when you minimize a program, it’s still there, running in the background, right? You just can’t see it, you’re not aware of it, but it’s not closed all the way, either. That’s sort of how the rapid learning-slash-thinking works.”</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“Okay. So how does that translate to almost passing out at a crime scene?”</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“I didn’t almost pass out.”</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“That’s debatable.”</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“Whatever.” She waves a hand. “So anyway. When I turn it on...okay, going back to the computer, you know when you use it for too long, or it’s using up too much RAM, and then the fans just start fucking screaming at you?”</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“....Kind of?”</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“Hah.” I knew he couldn’t be that computer literate yet. “So imagine my abilities are programs. Some of them take up more harddrive space than others, and some of them use up more energy to run. This is one of them.”</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“So you used your rapid learning for too long, and that’s what made you almost pass out.”</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“That’s debatable.”</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“Are you okay?” He glances at her, and despite their banter, there’s genuine concern there. It almost makes her smile. Almost. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“I’m fine,” she says. “It doesn’t take me that long to recover if I close the program.”</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>He nods a little, then seems to change his mind. “No. You don’t look well.”</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>She glances at herself in the rearview mirror and is annoyed to find that he’s right. Her olive skin has gone a dull shade lighter, and there are circles under her eyes. Her mind might feel okay, but her body hasn’t recovered. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“Get some sleep,” Steve says. “We have a couple hours.”</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“I cannot believe you broke out your Captain voice just to tell me to take a nap.”</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“I don’t have a Captain voice. ”</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“Don’t play dumb.”</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>He’s quiet for a moment. Then: “I’ll admit I have a Captain voice if you agree to sleep.” </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“...I’ll agree to try to sleep,” she replies. “No promises.”</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“Deal.”</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“Say it.”</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“After the serum, they had me work with a voice coach for the USO shows,” he says, and she could swear he sounds embarrassed under that carefully cultivated neutral tone. “It...may have carried over onto the battlefield.”</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“I knew it.”</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“If you tell anyone, I’ll deny it, and you know they’ll believe me over you.”</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>She grins. “This is a fun side to you.”</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“Go to sleep, Whittaker,” he says, and then, in a just slightly exaggerated version of the Captain voice they were discussing, he adds “That’s an order.”</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“Ugh. Fine, whatever, dad,” she says, and reaches for his jacket in the back of the car before balling it up as a makeshift pillow. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>She doesn’t actually plan on sleeping, just avoiding conversation, but apparently she’s more tired than she thought she was, because soon her eyes slip shut, and they don’t open for hours. </span>
</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
          <p>Sorry for the delay, not going to go into details but there's been a lot going on. Anyways I've been excited to post this chapter for awhile; I really like Steve and Leila's banter in the car and I hope you do too.</p>
        </blockquote></div></div>
<a name="section0006"><h2>6. Chapter 6</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Summary for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
            <p>Steve and Leila save the day, with some help from a friend.</p>
          </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>
  <span>It’s twilight when she wakes up. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>She’d managed to get Steve to agree to letting her call her contacts before she fell asleep. Not that she wouldn’t have done it anyway, but listening to him bitch about it as she got voicemail after voicemail might’ve actually made her snap, so it’s still for the best. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>Now, though, she’s the one getting the call; she’s woken by the feel of her phone ringing in her pocket. It’s kind of unsettling how easy it was to fall asleep with him there, but she ignores it and pulls her phone out of her pocket, hitting accept. “You’re on speaker, Vira.”</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“I got ahold of Fury,” Vira says breathlessly on the other end. “I mean, he got ahold of me, but I told him what happened. Where are you?”</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“We’re five minutes out,” Steve replies, not looking away from the road. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“You were right. Harker has chitauri tech. We think he’s used it to enhance one of his students’ projects but we don’t know which one.”</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“Which one is most conveniently explosive?” Leila asks, and there’s the sound of typing before Vira responds. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“One kid made a fission generator,” she says finally. “But it’s pretty small.”</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>Leila thinks for a moment, tries to place what chitauri tech is capable of, and then remembers suddenly, the way that all the chitauri in new york were linked. With each other, with their weapons--it was like fighting one single entity, with all the cost and benefits that came with it. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“But if he built a bigger one, he could connect it to the smaller one. Blow up one, blow up the other.”</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“That means we have to stop the bigger one,” Steve says, glancing at her. “Like Stark did with the missile.”</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“Vira, do we know where the bigger generator would be?”</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>More typing. “There’s a huge energy signature coming from the boiler room,” she says. “It’s in the basement on the other side of campus.”</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“That’s where Harker will be,” Leila says. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“And the generator,” Steve adds. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“We can only hope,” Vira says dryly. “SHIELD is on their way with evac, but they won’t be there in time for diffusion. The fair started ten minutes ago, it could go off at any minute. Disarming the explosion is on you.” </span>
</p><p> </p>
<hr/><p> </p><p>
  <span>The parking lot is crowded when they arrive, cars packed like sardines alongside each other, a monument to the prestige of the exhibit. Leila would be surprised if there was even one spot available. Steve doesn’t even try, just parks across the street, cuts the engine and takes off running. She follows. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>There are a few security guards walking the perimeter, and she pulls out another fake cred, this time FBI. Security guards usually don’t have the same God complex that cops do, she’s found. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>They pass a guard and she flashes him a badge. “Where’s the boiler room?” she demands, and he peers at the badge before his eyes widen and he points southwest of their direction. “Across campus, in the basement under the cafeteria,” he stutters. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“Great. Don’t let anyone else in the gym,” she tells him, putting her badge away. “Even if they work here.”</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“Especially if they work here,” Steve adds-slash-corrects, and she nods and follows him into a run. </span>
</p><p> </p>
<hr/><p><br/>
<br/>
<span>The boiler room is locked, but Steve manages to break the lock anyway while barely trying.</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“Remind me to try that later,” Leila says. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“You still have the serum?”</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“Only until I need an excuse to see you shirtless again,” she quips, and he scoffs, but she’s sure if the lights were on she’d see him blushing. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>The overhead lights in the boiler room are off, but there’s a dim blue luminosity hovering in it, making it at least bright enough to see that the room is huge, and labyrinthine, pipes snaking around walkways and ladders like a maze of machinery. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>The light is coming from around the corner, and she can see a shadow bouncing around near the wall. Movement. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“I have to be the one to take him in,” Leila whispers. Steve might not technically be a civilian, but she’s pretty sure he doesn’t have the power to arrest people. She pulls out her phone and hands it to him. “Vira should be in the recent calls. Call her and ask her to walk you through disarming--”</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“Disarming what, now?”</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>It’s almost comically villainous, the way Felix Harker steps out from around the corner, his hair sticking up like some kind of mad scientist--probably static, but still. His shadow is long behind him and the dim blue glow of what she assumes is the generator around the corner makes him look like a cartoon character. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“This is usually where I’d make a joke, but you already look like one,” Leila replies, pulling out her gun. “I’m Agent Leila Whittaker with SHIELD. Stand down, Harker.”</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“Oh, I know who you are,” Harker assures her. “You’re Snow White. You saved New York. With the help of Captain Rogers, of course.” Harker turns his gaze to Steve. There’s nothing but disdain for either of them. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>Steve doesn’t have a weapon on him (that she knows of) but she sees him shift into a more fight-ready pose out of the corner of her eye.  </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“SHIELD will be here any minute. It’s over,” she tells him. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“Really? Damn, that sucks. I was really hoping I could take a minute to tell you about my evil plan.” With that, he shoots the chitauri blaster right above Leila’s head, hitting the pipe above her. </span>
</p><p> </p>
<hr/><p> </p><p>
  <span>It’s the second time in less than two weeks that they’ve found themselves in this position, with Steve’s body hovering over Leila’s--this time in the aftermath of him having pushed her out of the way of the falling pipe. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>He rolls off her and onto his feet and she follows. There’s a crash around the corner and when they round it, they see the chitauri generator--big, blue, kind of looks like Stark Industries’ arc reactor--but something in it is damaged. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“Consider that my evil plan being expedited,” Harker says from around another corner. “We’ll see if SHIELD gets here soon enough to stop it.”</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>Leila turns to Steve, still moving. “Stay here, call Vira. I’m going after him.”</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>And before Steve can speak, there’s a crash from behind them, from way behind them, and screaming. The gym. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“I’m gonna go help them,” Steve says. “You handle Harker.”</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“No,” she snaps, and he was already on his way to turning around when she does. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“Someone needs to handle this--” she continues, gesturing to the generator. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“You do it, you’d probably be better at it than me anyway.”</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“I have to take in Harker!”</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“So he gets away, so what?”</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“So he builds a bigger explosion next time and more people die, you absolute fucking dumbass.”</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>Steve’s eyes narrow. God, she does not have time for this argument. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“So we just leave them?” Steve gestures back to the screaming. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“Of course not. SHIELD is coming, we’re not just leaving them, but if we don’t diffuse the generator--” as if on cue, a few sparks shoot from the generator, indicating the time ticking down.</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“How do I know they’re coming?” Steve demands, and that’s really the crux of it, isn’t it? He’s not convinced SHIELD cares. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>And honestly, Leila’s not even sure he’s wrong, or how good or bad SHIELD really is. It’s just that she just almost got concussed (not that it would last, but still) and Harker could be anywhere and there’s a ticking clock on this mission, or whatever it is, and God, Steve fucking Rogers has the absolute worst timing in picking fights. There are too many variables swirling around the situation, and she doesn’t have the wherewithal to think over her words carefully. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“You’re just going to have to trust me,” she says instead, instinctively, almost desperately.</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>And maybe it’s that desperation that reaches him, that makes him pull her phone out of his pocket and say “Okay. Go.”</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>She runs. </span>
</p><p><br/>
<br/>
</p>
<hr/><p><br/>
<br/>
</p><p>
  <span>Felix Harker might be a genius, but he can’t fight for shit. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“You know,” he says, when he’s almost lost, probably to distract her, “I haven’t heard from our friend in awhile. Listen. You hear the silence?”</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“No, I just hear bullshit coming out of your mouth,” she says, hooking a foot under his leg to bring him to his knees. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“I’m just saying,” he says, looking up at her, “I overheard your little conversation. Echoes,” he adds, waving a hand. She grabs his wrist, and then the other one, and starts tying them with the tape measure she’d grabbed off a custodial cart during the chase. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>She ignores him, or tries to. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“He didn’t sound convinced, is all I’m saying,” Harker says. “Who’s to say he didn’t leave the generator the minute you turned your back?”</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>And Leila knows she shouldn’t let him get under her skin. She knows he’s just trying to distract her, or trick her, get her to turn her back on him so he can make his getaway. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>It’s just that her whole argument for Steve staying was that he should trust her, and Leila is probably the least trustworthy person she knows. If it wasn’t enough for Steve, she probably couldn’t even fault him for it. Not that much, anyway. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>If she had a walkie talkie she’d be radioing him. She can’t call him; he has her phone (God, she should’ve taken his), and anyway, if he did stay behind, he’d already be on the line with Vira, and going off his assumed prior experience, she’s not even convinced he knows how to decline an incoming call when he’s already on the line, so there’s basically know way to contact him, and--</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>She spends a few tense, heavy moments in that silence, keeping her eyes trained on Felix Harker because fuck if she’s going to let him get the best of her even if he does happen to be right--</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>And then the blue light goes out. </span>
</p><p> </p>
<hr/><p> </p><p>
  <span>There’s a particular kind of annoyance that comes with Leila’s abilities, which is: the feeling of knowing that you would have been better off if you’d chosen a different ability that day. There is no hyperspecific German word for the feeling that she knows of. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>There was a little old lady Leila met in Berlin once with enhanced eyesight, including night vision. A lightweight ability, and one that would really come in handy in apprehending a subject in pitch black. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>Instead, she has the useless supersoldier abilities that stop at 20/10 vision in the daylight. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>Felix Harker takes the opportunity caused by the sudden darkness and gets away, and she’s trying to decide which way she thinks he went based on sound, when she hears--</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“Leila?”</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>She turns around to find Steve shrouded in shadow, using her phone as a flashlight. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“It’s done,” he says. “The generator--”</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“It’s not over,” Leila says. “Harker got away.”</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“No,” a familiar female voice says from behind her, as the lights suddenly go on, “he didn’t.”</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>Steve’s face lights up in recognition and relief, and Leila turns to see Natasha holding Felix Harker by the shoulders, his hands tied with a zip tie. He looks furious, like he knows it’s really over now, but he stays quiet this time. Leila can only assume it’s out of fear; Natasha does that to people, even where Leila can’t. It’s something she’s always envied. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“That’s a pretty small fish for them to send you to catch,” Leila says. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“You’re welcome,” Nat replies. “Besides, I was in the area.”</span>
</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
          <p>Was going to wait until tomorrow to post this, but tomorrow I'm gonna be busy with family stuff, so you get the chapter a day early. I hope you enjoy it. Love y'all.</p>
        </blockquote></div></div>
<a name="section0007"><h2>7. Chapter 7</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>
  <span>“So this is your life, huh?”</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>It’s one of those summer nights where it’s warm even after the sun goes down. Were it not for all the bombing-related activity, the campus of Midtown High just after twilight would be kind of pretty. It’s almost a college campus, and it’s just on the cusp of summer, when things are still blooming but not dried out yet. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>Unfortunately, that night the campus is defined by what happened there. There are cop cars everywhere, parents and students wearing shock blankets (no injuries, except for one man who dislocated a shoulder trying to break down a door), and three quinjets on the football field. They’ll need to take more funding from the arts to fix the lawn, she thinks idly. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“I wish I could say it’s never boring, but honestly it’s usually way more boring than this.” It’s true; operating without SHIELD’s safety net under her has been an adventure. Not one she’d prefer to do again, but not a wholly unenjoyable one, either. She mentally files Steve Rogers into the “actively prefers company” folder in her mind. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“Maybe that’s because it usually doesn’t have me,” Steve says, and she grins, remembering their conversation from the gym. Honestly, he might not be wrong. Ever since he walked into her life, it’s gotten a lot more eventful, even for someone in her line of work. She hasn’t decided if eventful is good or bad yet. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“What happens now?” Steve asks as Felix Harker is led into a quinjet.</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“He goes to trial,” she says “and, given all the witnesses, loses. They keep him away from the public. Get answers.” Like how the hell he got Vira Kovaleva’s phone number, or how he managed to break into the bank.</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“Try to rehabilitate him,” she continues. “Maybe SHIELD even hires him, if that goes well.”</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“That’s the kind of person SHIELD hires?”</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>There’s a lot of different ways Leila could respond. She could try to back down on the hiring criminals thing. She could try to defend it. She could spin it. Or she could tell the truth, or something close to. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>Part of it is that she’s just tired, and doesn’t feel like questioning her instincts that hard. But she also knows, somehow, that honesty is the best way to get him on board. At least at this point. Leverage the good will she’s garnered from him. It could completely break his chances of joining, but it could also be the thing that seals it for him. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“I dunno,” Leila says, “It worked out pretty well for me.”</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>Steve looks vaguely surprised at this, and she wonders if it’s the fact that she has a shady past or the fact that she just admitted it to him. Before she can ask, she hears “I think New York would agree,” and turns around. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“Hey, Nat.”</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“Hey, Princess.” Nat turns to Steve. “Cap’n. Looks like your lunch date got interrupted.”</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“No one died. That’s the important part.”</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“Right.” Nat smirks, like she knows something they don’t, and nods back at the helicarrier. “You need a ride? We’re heading back to New York.”</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“We drove here. I don’t want my car towed.”</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“He’s weird about his car,” Leila adds.  </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“Why does that not surprise me?” Nat asks. “See you around, Cap.”</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“You too, Romanoff,” he says by way of farewell. Then, to Leila, he adds, “Hey, Manhattan.”</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>It takes her a second to process the nickname before she turns, smiling. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“Thanks,” he says. “For everything.”</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“You too, Brooklyn,” she says, and he smiles as he turns back to the parking lot. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“So I missed a lot,” Nat says as Leila turns back to her. “You guys have pet names for each other already?”</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“They’re more like vague insults.”</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“That’s what pet names are. Rumlow will be shattered.”</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>Leila rolls her eyes, not bothering to argue. She’s pretty sure Nat just finds Leila’s introversion and aversion to romance fun to toy with. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“So how about it, Princess? You need a ride?”</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>And Leila considers it. The thought of sleeping in the on-call room is </span>
  <em>
    <span>very </span>
  </em>
  <span>enticing. But then she considers everything else that’s happened that day. And what she said to Steve before Nat showed up. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“I would,” Leila says, “but I still have a mission to finish. Fury’s orders.”</span>
</p><p> </p>
<hr/><p><br/>
<br/>
</p><p>
  <span>Steve isn’t surprised when Leila asks him for a ride, and he doesn’t wait long before asking. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“So?”</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“So what?”</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“So what do you think I’m gonna say?” </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>She doesn’t bother to play dumb, just looks at him expectantly. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“You think I don’t know Fury wanted you to recruit me?”</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“Smart boy,” she says. “When’d you figure it out?”</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“When you offered to come to the barbeque with me. You’re not exactly the social type.”</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“Wow, you know me so well,” she deadpans. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“Am I wrong?”</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“I didn’t say that.” She leans back in her seat, looking out at the highway. It’s kind of pretty at night, all the lights in the dark. “But you wouldn’t have said yes if you weren’t already considering joining. Am </span>
  <em>
    <span>I</span>
  </em>
  <span> wrong?”</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“Maybe not,” he says, and glances at her. “What do you think I should do?”</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>Leila considers this carefully, and it’s one of those fun moments where the thing she’s pretty sure is the right thing to do for the person in front of her happens to be the right thing to do for SHIELD, too. Which is good, because if she’s really honest with herself, she’s not 100% sure what she’d choose if she had to. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“I think you should talk to Peggy Carter about it,” she says finally. “I assume Fury gave you her contact information, right?”</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“Yeah.”</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“Have you reached out yet?”</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“I don’t know what I’d say,” he says quietly, keeping his eyes trained on the road. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“Say ‘my extremely smart, cool, hot coworker suggested I ask you for advice about whether I should join SHIELD, the organization you helped found and named after me, and I decided that coworker is always right about everything.’”</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“Great, I’ll say that. Can you write it down for me?”</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“Sure. Don’t forget the part about me being hot. It </span>
  <em>
    <span>will </span>
  </em>
  <span>inform the answer she gives you.”</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“How could I forget?” he rolls his eyes, and she smiles. </span>
</p><p> </p>
<hr/><p><br/>
<br/>
</p><p>
  <span>Leila wakes up alone the next morning, but for once, it doesn’t bother her so much. It’s weird. There’s still this warm, frantic energy running around from the day before. Maybe this is what it feels like when you have actual conversations with people. She’s not sure. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>What does bother her is the fact that once again, her phone is waking her up. At least it’s from a dreamless sleep, this time. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>She grabs her phone off the nightstand and hits the green button without checking the ID. “Hello?”</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“Call Fury,” Steve says without greeting. “Tell him I’m in.”</span>
</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
          <p>And that's the end of Queen's Gambit! Next fic will wrap up some of the loose ends from this one. Hope you guys liked the chapter, would love to hear what you think!</p>
        </blockquote></div></div>
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